A Loquat of Leaves

Storm Ashley almost passed us by yesterday but we did catch a bout of torrential rain and very strong winds for a few hours.
The strong winds managed to strip a load of leaves from the Loquat tree. They are large, leathery, leaves and yesterday afternoon, when it brightened up, the twins, along with Buddy and Hendrix, picked up quite a lot and put them in the garden bag. Still left a lot covering the paths and bushes. This morning I got my blower out and tidied up but I didn't want to scatter the Loquat leaves so used a stiff brush to gather them before picking them up to go into the garden waste bin. Good timing Ashley, it's green bin day tomorrow!
For many years we called the Loquat tree the 'Beirut Tree' because it was grown from a seed that I brought back from a business trip to Beirut in 1994. The Loquat fruit were amongst other fruits in a complimentary bowl in my hotel room. When I was there the city was still a ruin from the civil war but my hotel was on top of the mountain at a village called Beit Mery (House of my Lord).
In my room was a laminated text and photograph showing a large black hole in the hotel as the result of a rocket being fired into it. The black hole was my room, it was beautiful when I was there though! Standing on my balcony, looking over East and West Beirut, the Cedar trees still had chunks out of them from the small and large arms fire that raged there.